Editorials|1 September 1945

IMMUNITY AND IMMUNOLOGICAL REACTIONS IN MUMPS

Abstract

The etiological agent in mumps was first isolated by Johnson and Goodpasture1 and by Findlay and Clarke.2 These investigators were able to reproduce the disease in monkeys (Macacus) by injecting into the parotid duct saliva from human cases of mumps obtained during the first or second day of the disease. They demonstrated that the agent was a filtrable virus which was present in the saliva of the patients and in the tissue of the infected parotid glands of the monkeys. They also found that after recovery the monkeys were immune to reinoculation. Until recently, however, little was known as to